Armed gardai storm city pub after taunts by gang thug

Criminals with ties to Gerry ‘The Monk’ Hutch barricaded themselves into the north inner city pub

Armed gardai stormed the pub in the north inner city

Heavily-armed gardai stormed a north inner city pub after a number of criminals linked to the Hutch gang barricaded themselves into the premises.

The chaotic scenes which took place in the early hours of last Friday morning began when a well-known north Dublin criminal taunted officers who were on an armed patrol as he stood outside the pub.

It is understood that the 23-year-old thug, who is suspected of being heavily involved in car theft scams and drug dealing, made his presence known to the detectives who drove by the pub.

"He was slagging off the officers about one of their colleagues who had been murdered in the line of duty," a source said.

The detectives in the patrol car got out of their vehicle to deal with the criminal, who continued to verbally abuse them.

At this stage, a young man who is a relative of crime boss Gerry 'The Monk' Hutch bizarrely threw his mobile phone at the approaching officers.

The duo and a number of other men then barricaded themselves into the pub before the armed officers were able to approach them.

"They locked themselves in the pub and they would not come out," a source said.

Gardai at the scene called for back-up. Officers from the Special Detective Unit (SDU) as well as gardai who were patrolling the area as part of Operation Hybrid, rushed to the area which has seen a gang feud related murder in its vicinity this year.

Chaos

A large number of officers then stormed the pub and arrested the 23-year-old criminal who had been taunting the officers.

The young male Hutch relative was also questioned about throwing his phone at gardai but was not detained. However, his phone was seized.

Garda investigations later established that the 23-year-old had a number of outstanding penal warrants for unpaid court fines.

After being questioned at Store Street Garda Station about what is being described as a "public order incident", the man, who is originally from the Kilbarrack area, was then brought to Mountjoy Prison so the penal warrants against him could be executed.

He spent a number of hours in the jail before being released over the weekend. A file on Friday morning's incident will now be prepared for the DPP.

Last week's pub incident was the second to involve criminals linked to the Hutch mob which has led to a robust garda response.

Last month, in a separate north inner city pub, dozens of officers responded to a 'back up' request from their colleagues after three drunken gangland thugs threatened to shoot gardai when they attempted to arrest them after a pub 'lock-in' descended into chaos.